Toka-Ace #1: The Re-Emergence

I dropped Elyse off at her home and as fast as I possibly could, I drove back to my house. I turned on to my block. My heart went into my throat when I saw the fire trucks parked outside of my house. The fire fighters had just finished putting out the blaze.

The house was a charred skeleton gutted by the fire. Neighbors stood on their porches stupidly gawking at the scene.

I parked behind a fire truck and got out of the car. “What happened?” I asked the nearest fireman. “This is my house. Is everyone okay?” I asked frantically.

His weary, smoke blackened face looked sympathetic. “Come with me son.” The firefighter led me to one of the fire trucks. Andrew sat on the back bumper. He had his head buried in his hands.

I was relieved at least to see Andrew. I expected to see Mom. Maybe she was being questioned about how the fire started and would join us momentarily.

“Andrew,” I placed my hand on his shoulder so he’d look up.

He looked up at me. His eyes were puffy and red. His green eyes were hollow and his face raw and blank.

For a moment, I just couldn’t say anything. There just were so many questions and so many worries.

“Where’s Mom?” I asked.

Andrew shook his head. He made a noiseless sob. “She’s dead,” he choked out.

In that moment my heart sank. My breathing became shallow. Everything seemed to spin and everything seemed to recede away from me. How could this happen?

The euphoria from my date drained away. Mom dead, it was hard to comprehend. I kept thinking there must be some mistake-it was some other woman they were talking about not Mom.

I was only vaguely aware of what happened next. A policeman questioned us about relatives-we had none-and then Andrew and I were placed in the basement of a church for the night. The volunteers set us up with a couple of cots to sleep on along with pillows and blankets.

There were about thirty different cots in the church all of them neatly arranged and most of them occupied by homeless people. I guess that now included Andrew and me.

The basement ceiling was low and the walls were a light shade of red. There were lamps by each of the beds. Neither Andrew nor I could sleep. We didn’t say anything. I looked at Andrew. He was on his back staring straight up at the ceiling. He lay still, as though the gravity of it all was weighing him down.

I couldn’t help but feel guilty. Andrew had tried to contact me and I ignored him. It was an awful feeling, a weight in my stomach.

“Andrew?” I said.

He looked at me, a vacant expression on his face.

“I’m sorry,” I said sincerely. “I had no idea that…” I tried to find the right words.

“You should have picked up. You should have come home. Maybe there was something that we could have done,” Andrew said accusingly.

I was stunned. Andrew was blaming me. “What could I have done?” I countered weakly. “What could you have done? What possible good could we have done together? It was a fire.”

Andrew sat up. “I called you fifteen times! I left you fifteen text messages. What, were you so busy lip locking Elyse that you couldn’t get home?”

His accusations were like a slap to the face. “How dare you blame me? Did I start the fire? What did you do? What was I supposed to just snap my fingers and extinguish the fire?” I snapped. “You’re being totally irrational.”

“Look,” Andrew said. “I know that there was nothing that we could have done about it, but I still believe that you should have been there.”

“To do what?” I exploded with sudden anger and jumped to my feet. “To watch the flames spread and wipe away everything?” I was shaking with rage. For an all too uncomfortable few moments, Andrew and I stared at each other.

Andrew said nothing. He was emotionally drained, confused, and didn’t have the energy to put up a fight. “Sorry, man.” He shook his head. “I know that it’s not your fault. It just hurts, you know?”

“Of course, I know. You don’t think I’m hurting too? Nothing is going to get solved with us lashing out at each other.” I said, trying to control my emotion. I sat back down and lay on my back.

My mother was gone. My house and my life were gone. The only thing that I wanted to do was sleep. Maybe when I woke up I would be back in my bed and then this would all be a bad dream.

I expected my anxiety to play all sorts of tricks on my mind. But no thoughts crossed my mind as I stared at the ceiling. I was in limbo.